With a win against the Chicago Bears, three touchdowns, and 131 yards on the ground, Running back Tony Pollard looked fantastic in his first start at the running back position. With his success, some fans are wondering if he has proven himself to take over as the main running back for the Dallas Cowboys.
At the moment, Running back Ezekiel Elliott is the #1 running back in Dallas and is the starter. After being ruled out by Cowboys staff for the game due to minor leg injuries, Tony Pollard came in and replaced him for this week.
Tony sure put on a show, helping the Cowboys to score 49 total points in the game. These are the most points the Cowboys scored in a game all season, thanks to Pollard. It’s hard to believe that Tony is qualified to become the starter, but when you look deeper into how it can help the team, it may be a good choice.
One example is that Elliott is getting older. Sadly, the truth hurts. This is his 7th season and he’s been getting beaten up for a long time. Perhaps it’s time to rest him up and start sitting him out more. Now I am not saying don’t play him, but maybe only play Ezekiel for the goal-line runs.
Elliott is built better than Pollard, no argument there, but maybe if the Cowboys can only use Elliott when needed (such as big pushes and runs at the goal line) then that would extend his career and not put so much pressure on him.
Another point on why Pollard should take over is simply because he has much more mobility than Elliott. Ezekiel is stronger for sure and plows through the other team’s defenders, but Pollard is good at dodging and avoiding tackles. This comes in handy when playing teams with fast defenders.
One thing Pollard needs to work on if he wants to be a starter is strength. He has speed, awareness, and dodge abilities, yet another skill running backs need is strength to push through the other team’s players. Elliott has more power than Pollard at the moment.
This is one of the reasons that for the last couple of years Elliott has still been the starter for the Cowboys because of his power and skill to push hard through opponents. I feel that if Tony can solve his lack of strength, he can for sure take the starting role.
As of right now, Tony Pollard has a total of 506 yards while Elliott only has 443 this season. Elliott also has more attempts than Pollard, 109 to 81 attempts. Pollard has a total of 5 touchdowns this year and Elliot only has four.
Can’t argue with those kind of stats, Pollard has got the numbers to show for his performances. This being said, I would like to see Pollard take a couple of games and be the starter. Give Elliott some rest and only put him in when you need a powerful push on plays, but let Pollard start taking some more snaps, he has shown that when given the chance, Tony can deliver.
I like Ezekiel Elliott and I think he’s a great running back, however, it looked like for the first time since last season, our offense looked great and performed above and beyond. It seems that Pollard was one of the main reasons it did so well.
I say let Tony start for the next couple of games (after the bye-week) and see what he can do while in that position. After all, if you are winning games by large margins, then who cares who’s playing the position? Winning games is the only goal in the NFL and if the Cowboys are winning more games with Tony, then they should stick with that.
